On being donated a few rolls of 35mm black & white film, I decided to run them through my Voigtlander rangefinder camera.

While taking photographs (and enjoying the immediate results) with my usual digital camera and new phone, I enjoyed the time spent on setting up photos with a film camera for images I will not see until they return from the (yet to be chosen) printers.

Its this time taken over that has been the most attractive thing about taking photographs on film again. A roll or two into this venture, while scanning a plethora of old transparencies, I thought both about the film images I took, developed and printed in the past, as well as the cameras I used to take them.

Towards the end of the recent photo podcast I took part in, we were asked about which photos we wanted to take in future. I said that I wanted to take more time over my images: slower, more considered photography, if you will. I thought about my medium format camera and how using it slowed down the whole process of image making. I thought about large format cameras and how precise one had to be in using them. I considered returning to previous digital images in order to refine them by taking better versions with improved compositions and lighting. In all, I thought about a photography beyond “snapping”.

This may lead to my taking fewer images, which may be a relief considering the many digital photos I’ve catalogued recently. The opportunity to really craft photos, for lighting, composition and subject, will develop my practice in extraordinary ways.